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If everything is going to hell, then why am I so upbeat?

ABC - Always Be Closing. Good Advice...

Polls-schmolls. Nobody knows nuthin....

Here's a small breakdown of what I think at this late date in the game.

1. Its 2000 all over again. I said awhile back, that for Obama to win this election, he would have to have a landslide and that all John McCain needed to do was continue to break even and he would probably win. The late undecideds would go for the "safe bet" in the election and that was before the world economy collapsed in September.

I see lots of polls. I don't see any poll that shows a landslide Obama win. Sorry kids, you take the outliers on either end and toss them in the trash and the rest, thats the polls that matter. Those show its within 3-5 at best for Obama. Thats margin of error- that's a tie.

Incredible as it may seem, we are right back where we were on the 2000 election. We could finish this election once again with an electoral college win on one side and a popular vote for the other guy.

For either McCain - Or Obama. And wouldn't that be funny as hell if it were Obama who got the Electoral College win!

Advantage McCain.

2. Shopping habits. This last couple of months have been historic times for Americans and the world. The reason why everyone you meet these days is ready to bite your head off is all sorts of things they used to be able to count on has suddenly gone into a tailspin. If I were to categorize the entire American electorate right now, I would say two words would do it:

"Risk Averse"

Everyone is making decisions in their daily life right now, but no one is taking any risk. Buy a car? Ahhh, not right now honey, lets wait on that for a bit, ok? Hey should we swing our savings into some real estate right now babe? Ah, no not right this second, I'm filling out my resume and buying bullion. You see the Stock Market going all over the place, which I admit is fun, but what you don't see is trading volume. America is losing sleep because their mattresses are stuffed with dollar bills right now. These are dollars that used to be in their 401k, but now, people are looking at those dollars to make it through a some of the next few months rather than buying a new speedboat or condo in Maui.

When people are in survival situations, they don't tend do risky things. I don't think the Donner Party spent a lot of time wondering how they could do a bit of bungee jumping off the cliff tops while they waited for rescue. People tend to get focused on "Maslows Hierarchy of Needs" when there is a lot of risk in the air and they are trying to survive.

Its into this environment that Barack Obama has decided to start talking about taxes and specifically why you don't pay enough. His Vice President has already started redefining wealth down to 150,000 a year. Mistake? Well sure, it could be, but I think we know what he means. He means that 250, 150, heck its just a number we picked out of the sky anyway, so what the hell, right? Anyway, it's not about raising revenue to keep the government running, its about "fairness", right? Come on man, everyone loves a little "fairness", don't they?

Note to Barack Obama - Your timing stinks.

Right now, right here in the middle of all this, the "new kid on the block" wants to diddle with the Tax System, take your 401k away and make it so you never want to buy stocks or bonds again, all to create his idea of a socialist paradise right here on earth, just for you, the voter! Eh, Sorry kid, nows not a good time, why don't you come back when things have settled down a bit, ok?

You think back to the last time we elected a Democrat to the White House. It was 1992. What was significant about that year is it was the first time in many of our lifetimes that we could say that there was no real big threat or risk to a Nuclear War. That was really, really big for us back then. We could, for the very first time afford the luxury of a president who wasn't a "wartime military qualified" President. We took a risk on Bill Clinton, because we could do it without fearing for our lives.

Now we have Russia's Putin putting the bear back in the woods and he's hungry, frankly hes eating all of the neighbors that he can get his hands on and threatening the rest of them. Venezuela is now run by a fat version of Castro. Iran wants the bomb so bad they are probably even willing to kill for it. We are in the worst financial crisis in 60 plus years, if not in the entire history of mankind and no one can tell how much oil there really is out there to still be had and so on, and so on etc, etc...

Oh yeah, and the Islamic terrorists are still out there, doing what they do best. killing and maiming women and children in increasingly more disgusting and inhumane ways.

So tell me, you feel like taking a little risk with the fundamental foundation of your country right now, hmmm?

Advantage McCain.

3. The-Car-Salesman-who-tries-too-damn-hard. You go into a car lot because you like a certain car, and you want to buy the car, and suddenly you get 'Mr. Slick' right there with you at all time, he's so on top of you that he's practically humping your leg like he's Ernest T. Bass' bloodhound. Whatever you might have thought of the car and no matter the price, you just have to get away from this guy.

This is what it feels like to be "uncommitted" in this election.

I found myself watching the Military channel this weekend and guess what I saw. Each and every commercial break was an ad for Barack Obama. Now, I thought it was funny because it just showed me what a fire hose of cash the Obama campaign has at its disposal. But I can bet that more than a handful of people who watch the Military Channel and were toss ups, found after two hours of watching nonstop impressions of "Hi Im Barack from Shamwow!" or "Barack Obama - Apply directly to the forehead" from his deep saturation campaign ads that viewers were now (thanks to the never ending barrage) making up their minds, but in favor of McCain.

The thing is, when people get a sense of creepy "overselling", they start to think, "Gee Mister, you sure do want me to but that Pontiac Aztek awfully bad don't you. I wonder if there is something wrong with it. If its so good, then why are you trying so damn hard"?

I think the biggest, weirdest part of the polls is the rather constant 10-11% who say, even today, that they are uncommitted. This has been one long assed campaign, I don't believe that anyone is still uncommitted after all we have seen in this unrelenting horror show we call "politics". What I do believe is that most people who are still saying they are "uncommitted" that they are now - in large part voting for McCain. They just don't want to explain to you why they are voting for McCain.

In some ways its just like high school, no one wants to be seen as voting for the "unpopular" kids, everyone wants to be seen sitting with the hip kids in the cafeteria, no one wants to be seen with the A/V Geeks. But come the mid-terms, everyone is calling the A/V Geeks for help with trigonometry homework. They just don't talk about it.

Advantage McCain.

4. The Polls. I believe the polls this year are unlike any other set of polling we have ever seen. In 1948, the problem was there was one polling group - Gallup, and they were just wrong. Everyone believed the polls they took that year because it was what those folks in the press of the day wanted to believe, not what was actually happening on the ground. It was the opposite problem of what we have now, and yet the problem was similar to todays situation. The problem we have now isn't that there is one polling group, its that there are hundreds and they are all feeding off of each other for their data and the result is, the data is crap. I saw Karl Rove tonight say that there have been more polls taken in the last 30 days then the entire 2004 race. And that seemed like a pretty intense race to me, didn't it to you?

It's not that we have too little data sampling, its that we have too much. In computer science, we call this sort of thing "thrashing". The CPU is running at a 110% but not very much work is really getting done. Its all sort of tangled up on itself.

You can't really use the polls this year for anything other than a general trend, the actual numbers are goofy and in my opinion its because the sample population is being oversampled. The trend is and continues to be, that yes, Obama is ahead, but consistently it moves back and forth about 3 to 5 points, which is within the margin of error. That is a tie, and as I said, a tie will mean that McCain is going to win the actual election.

And another thing, you can't really use the polls overall sampling because politcal polarization has reached a point in this country where people cant say the Presidents name in polite company. Support Bush? Sure you might still do that, and there are still three times as many that say that they do "Support Bush" than say they support Congress, but say it out loud? Oh I don't think so... Its just so, you know, icky...

If the polling groups were accurate, then several of the primary polls that showed Barack Obama winning against Hillary! would have held up. They didn't. Barack Obama consistently underperformed in the actual election against what he was polled to win. (Theres a reason for this that I will get to later.)

Advantage McCain.

5. The Kitchen Sink. I'll say this about Barack Obama, if he can run the country half as well as he has run his campaign, we should do ok. This guy has poured everything into this race. It really shows you what an incompetent clod John Kerry was in 2004( and in my opinion he still is an incompetent clod, but thats another subject for another time). Obama has done it all, he's taken every advantage he can, taken every shot he can get, thrown every bit of ammo there is into his target whenever and wherever he can. The Media is part of his campaign, and thats not just me saying it, they are saying it! They don't care, its no longer non-partial, they look right at ya and say they are on Obamas side. Its almost not a fair fight and you feel sort of sad for McCain, even if you don't like him.

And yet, theres good old John "Old Ironsides" McCain, sitting within the margin of error. Why cant Obama put this guy away? Its John McCain for crying out loud! John McCain tied himself to public financing so he hasn't got a dime. John McCain is a lifetime sufferer of the horrible disease of "Senator-itis". Senators make lousy candidates, the longer they are in the Senate, the worse they are and yeah, John McCain has been in the Congress since Barack Obama got out of High School.

And yet, Barack Obama, with the campaign equivalent of the entire 8th Air Force at his disposal, hasn't retired John McCain from the contest.

Why the hell not? Well lets be totally honest here, its not because John McCain is all that great of a candidate. He is a great man, but he is not a great candidate. Its not because John McCain is better or more capable campaigner than Obama, so what could it be?

Its because even now, there are significant doubts about Barack Obama. The risk factor, the fear factor, the dare I say it "old folks voting their pocketbooks and for their grandchildren" factor is the whats really keeping the "John McCain, Captain of the USS Constitution" afloat. Despite everything that the left and Obama has put downrange on John McCain, he still hasn't been "de-masted", and hes still fighting and he hasn't gone down with the ship. Its this fundamental "Failure to Close" that has caused Obama to go upside down in his primary polls vs. the actual election results ( see above.)

People respect that McCain is still in the game, and running hard against what can only be called overwhelming odds. You don't hear anyone saying "John McCain is too old" anymore, do you? With all his built in disadvantages, he's within the margin of error to a behemoth campaign of huge proportions. Thats not bad.

Advantage McCain.

What is it Alec Baldwin said in "Glengarry Glenn Ross"? "ABC - Always Be Closing?". Barack is out there selling like a demon, but he's just not closing the sale with the "Nyborgs", but in point of fact, the Nyborgs have long since made up their minds and they are not buying what you are selling, they just like to have you pay attention to them and keep them company.

My bet is that its going to be Barack Obama that is getting 'Steak Knives' and its McCain thats getting the Cadillac in this election contest.

So there you have it. In a few days, we will all see. Until then, nobody knows nuthin...

Posted @ October 29, 2008 09:11 PM | Current Affairs

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